


When the tears come streaming down your face

by Anonymous



Category: The Old Guard (Comics), The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Angst, Belts, Crying, Genital Torture, I Don't Even Know, M/M, Relieving tension through spanking, Smut, Sort of? I mean not really but, Spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:41:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27232906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Kinkmeme fill from; Joe/Nicky – harsh spanking + crying.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 1
Kudos: 63
Collections: anonymous





	When the tears come streaming down your face

**Author's Note:**

> This is the link for the kinkmeme fill! theoldguardkinkmeme.dreamwidth.org/3653.html?thread=1036869#cmt1036869
> 
> The prompt was; Joe/Nicky – harsh spanking + crying.  
> Sometimes, Nicky just needs to be hurt until he can have a good cry, so Joe bends him over and spanks him until his beloved is exhausted from crying and begging and squirming to try and get away.  
> Safe, sane, consensual – but Joe is ruthless and Nicky is a happy, bruised mess.

Joe's anger is like a firework; he's quick to ignite but fast to burn out again, and although he might remain too hot to touch (for everybody buy Nicky, usually) for a while, it normally doesn't take very long to find him back to his usual self. He doesn't tend to hold grudges without _very_ good reason, doesn't tend to hold onto memories or colour them with his anger ( if he _does_ remember, _does_ bring things up later on, it's often with humorous intentions ).

Nicky's anger, by contrast, is like being at the bottom of the ocean; it's cold, the pressure crushing Nicky from the inside until he can't take much more. He holds things close to his heart, remembers people who have wronged his family for _decades_ (prime example; the old woman outside the church in Serbia, who wouldn't let Joe pass when they'd gone to enter so that Nicky could light a candle on what would have been his younger sister's 948th birthday. If they ever found themselves back in Serbia, he would refuse to even _look_ at that church).

He's good at compartmentalising and rationalising, but sometimes, he lets things sit under his skin, lets them fester without an outlet, becoming colder and more closed off unless Joe can help him with it.

And it _is_ really only Joe who can help him to release that anger, especially when it's turned inward.

They've barely managed to step foot inside the tiny house just outside of Skenderaj after a truly disastrous mission that had ended with far too many innocent deaths, when the emotions Nicky's holding onto begin to make themselves known. He shrugs himself away from Joe's hand, which rests gently at the base of his spine as a point of contact – a _comfort_ Nicky doesn't feel like he deserves. Instead of relinquishing his grip, instead of letting go, Joe's hand fists in the back of Nicky's shirt, keeping them close together.

He's _forced_ to let go when Nicky twists out of his grasp, the movement graceful as ever – but there's something so _off_ about it that Joe can't help but narrow his eyes a fraction at the other man's back as Nicky moves off to check the upper level of the house. Nile moves off to check the downstairs, leaving Andy to look at Joe in that way she has, the one that says she already knows what's going to happen.

It doesn't take long for Nicky and Nile to return - the house really is tiny; the downstairs is open plan, the kitchen, dining room and living room all melded together, while the upstairs has two bedrooms that each contain a single bed (there's not really room for much else, so they have to make do with being in each others' space more than ever). Nicky doesn't make eye contact with any of them as he snaps out a _clear_ , finally shedding his heavy boots and immediately moving to examine what they have left over from their last stay in the cupboards in the kitchen. It's not much – rice, dried beans, dried soup mix – but it's enough to scrape together a meal for four people in a pinch.

Despite Nicky's tension, he washes his hands and forearms clean of the dirt and gore they've accumulated over the past couple of days before begins to make their family food as he usually does, the line of his shoulders tense enough not to invite conversation. Andy shakes her head at his turned back, gives Joe a glance and calls first shower before she heads upstairs.

Nile (still too new to know how these things go) sits at the dining table, trying (and failing) to pull more than snapped one word answers from Nicky as he rips open packages with just a little too much aggression.

Joe tries to pull Nicky out of himself before he can spiral much further, before he can do or say something that might hurt Nile's feelings, that he'll _regret_ later on (more than he already will). He tries to ground his other half through touch; gentle hands at the Genoan's shoulders as he sets a pan of water to boil, a soft kiss to his cheek and the back of his hair.

It doesn't work, but Joe isn't surprised. It doesn't usually work when Nicky's so sound up like this, when he's angry and already punishing himself by denying them both the touches he loves so much. “I'm _cooking,_ Joe.” It's snapped and accompanied by a twist of his hips that precedes the pale fist that thumps against the centre of the Maghrebi's chest before shoving him away harshly. Joe catches his coccyx painfully against the edge of the counter space behind him as the force of the push sends him stumbling backward into it (he counts himself lucky that Nicky didn't go for a knife first).

It's the last straw, and they both know it.

“Wait for me upstairs, Nicolò.” Joe's voice is low and quiet, steady despite the emotions that hold his heart in a choke-hold. Nicky's initial response is to close his eyes and suck in a deep breath through his nose, his head falling forward as the rest of his body falls completely still, the water bubbling merrily on behind him. “ _Nicolò_.” Joe lifts a hand to grasp the Genoan's chin _just this side_ of too tight, and is rewarded with Nicky's ocean-coloured eyes. “I'm _cooking_ , Joe.” It's competitively weak compared to the same words that had been snapped earlier, more of a _please let me feed our family_ than another _leave me alone_ , but Joe knows that Nicky's fast approaching his breaking point.

“I told you to wait for me upstairs. Don't make me repeat myself.”

Nile's watching them with wide eyes. Joe wishes she wouldn't, especially when Nicky's eyes flicker between them. “Go.” Joe tips his head toward the stairs as a damp and clean Andy reappears. Nicky swallows hard, his Adam's apple moving with it, but he obeys this time and heads upstairs silently. “We'll go to the grocery store, after we've eaten,” Andy decides abruptly, reaching out to touch Joe's shoulder lightly in support.

Dinner passes with little conversation, the clinking of cutlery against ceramic filling the spaces between the three of them. It's over quickly, Andy dragging Nile – who had showered briefly while Joe had finished boiling everything up together – back out of the house to find a supermarket to leave the two men alone to work things out. Before they leave, the Scythian tosses a brash “text me when you're done, and _don't_ do anything nasty on surfaces you won't bleach clean afterwards” over her shoulder. Joe appreciates the attempt at humour, he _does_ , but it's hard to when Nicky's upstairs and his heart is apparently still being strangled.

He makes his way upstairs, pausing outside their bedroom door until he hears a slight shifting noise that confuses him. When he pushes the door open, his eyes go automatically to the empty bed before finding his other half knelt on the wooden floorboards, his head bent and his hands clasped as if in prayer (closer examination reveals that Nicky is indeed praying, the Latin almost inaudible but for the slight puffs of air the Genoan emits as he mouths the words to himself).

“I don't think God's going to save you from what you have coming tonight, Nicolò.” The words are quiet and in no way mocking – an observation, more than anything, since God (or Allah) could have saved them from many things over the years, had He chosen to. If He hadn't chosen to save them from a lot of gruesome and sometimes unnecessary deaths, He wasn't likely to save Nicky from his own preferred form of therapy). Nicky's shoulders curl inward as Joe speaks, but he doesn't stop praying until he's recited the whole thing all the way through, and Joe doesn't interrupt.

“We spoke about this last time.” The disappointment in Joe's tone has tears pricking at the back of Nicky's eyes already, but that's not enough to make him let go of everything festering in his veins. Not yet. “I know, Joe. I'm sorry.” The apology is _barely_ louder than his prayer, but Nicky drags his burning eyes up until they rest on Joe's chest, right where his fist had been earlier. “You said that last time, Nicolò, and the time before that,” an involuntary wince from the Genoan, “you say that _every_ time, and yet, here we are again.”

There's a beat of silence as Joe takes everything in; the state of both their unshowered selves, the way Nicky's trembling a little and the shifting of his knees against the floorboards, the thoughts that were fixed on the one remaining bowl of food that Joe had shoved in the oven earlier. He takes a breath, sorting things out in his mind before focusing once more on an order of things. “Go and shower, Nicky. I'm going to get some things from downstairs, then I'll come and join you.”

Nicky doesn't need to be helped to his feet (he's spent enough time on his knees on various types of flooring over the centuries – even before dying the first time – to be used to far longer periods with his legs tucked under his body) but he accepts the hand Joe offers all the same, squeezing the fingers he knew as well as his own for a second before he left for the bathroom.

Left alone, Joe pressed his palms into his eyes until sparks of colour emerged, a silent sigh escaping him. He moved again as the noise of the shower filtered through to their bedroom, taking the stairs back down to collect a jug of water, two glasses and Nicky's dinner. These things were all left on their night-stand before Joe went searching through the closet in the hallway that was as tiny and cramped as the rest of the house – the closet where he, Nicky and Booker had kept their shared stash of clothes over the years. From the piles, he liberated two soft shirts and two pairs of boxer shorts, as well as a thick leather belt.

Leaving one set of clothes on the pillow with the belt, he strips off his bloodied clothes before heading to join Nicky under the shower spray.

The water, he quickly finds out, is freezing.

Nicky's standing under the spray of water, shivering and practically blue as Joe reaches in to set the water at a much more comfortable temperature. When he climbs in, the Maghrebi holds his other half's back to his chest, running soothing hands over Nicky's cold skin as if the simple touches will warm his love up faster than the warm water, which is running down the drain in a swirl of red and pink and brown and black as the remnants of their missions leave their bodies.

“You don't punish yourself, Nicolò. I give you what you need when you need it, remember?”

Nicky's responding shiver has little to do with the water temperature. He turns in Joe's arms, rests his forehead against the other man's clavicle and lays a gentle palm over the spot on the strong chest he'd shoved against earlier. “I shouldn't have pushed you away like that.” His voice cracks in the middle, the guilt threatening to choke him even as Joe holds him tighter, the steady beating of the Maghrebi's heart under the Genoan's palm doing little to settle Nicky's mental state.

The rest of the shower is brief and silent.

\-----

When they get back to their bedroom, Joe is dressed in the shirt and boxers he'd retrieved earlier, and Nicky is as naked as the day he was born. He's still quiet, even when his eyes touch on the belt that had been left on their pillow – even when he turns to face Joe, the questions are in his eyes and not on his lips. “Not much space in here.” Joe comments softly, reaching past Nicky to grasp the belt in a loose fist. Nicky licks his lips quickly before he shakes his head. “On the bed, Nico. I want to see if there's enough room to swing effectively.” There should be – if Joe's eyes don't deceive him, it'll be tight, but there should be enough space to be able to get the kind of impact Nicky needs.

The Genoan leans over, which pushes his ass out invitingly, to drag the pillow into the centre of the bed before climbing on, rearranging things until his hips are propped up and his hands are fisted in the bedcovers. Joe runs a gentle hand down Nicky's spine, feeling every knob of bone and every slight tremor under the pale skin before settling his palm in the square of Nicky's back and stepping into position a little to the left of his other half. Then, after lining up the belt with where exactly he wants his first hit to land, he lifts his arm and lets the leather fly.

It meets its mark with a sound like a gunshot, Nicky jolting forward with a gasp with the force of it – but he arches back for another. Joe gives it to him, laying another harsh hit right under the first. Another follows – another, and another, and another, all laid one below the other. The welts, the pain, the impact of each stroke... they won't last for more than a few minutes at a time, but that doesn't matter - what _matters_ is that Nicky feels like he's being scraped clean of his anger and his guilt with every slap of leather – what matters is that he's already loose and pliant and not trapped in his own skin.

He's not crying yet, though, not really. His eyes are full and wet, but the tears remain determinedly there, not falling just yet. He needs a little more, a _push_ to give him the emotional release he needs, the outlet for the things he feels roiling and writhing in his gut. “Tell me why we're here, Nicolò.” It's a demand, an _order_ , soft but posed with little room to refuse – there's no anger in Joe, not even when Nicky answers, “Those people died because of me.”

“No, Nico. Those people died because the men who had taken them knew that there was no way of getting away with the things they were doing.”

Another hit, a groan from Nicky as he grasps for another answer.

“I was rude to Nile.”

A murmur, another hit, this one to the back of his thighs that made the Genoan gasp for a breath he couldn't quite manage to catch.

“I wouldn't let you touch me, told you to leave me alone.”

Another hit, a single tear tracking its way unremarked down his cheek.

“I- I shoved you away.”

The next _crack_ has Nicky burying his face in his elbow, his hands still clutching the bedcovers like a lifeline.

“I put the shower on the coldest setting on purpose.”

The first sob breaks through his teeth, muffled because of his current position. Joe lays another harsh hit onto the reddened skin, right where thigh meets buttock, and Nicky's hips grind into the pillow as he jolts once more, choking on another sob.

The rocking against the pillow is getting him hard, though not through choice – it's just a natural reaction to the friction. It doesn't stop Joe from reaching down to grasp the base of his cock to stop any more of that in its tracks. If anything, the warm hand of his beloved makes the problem _worse_ – Nicky lets out a moan, his hips stuttering into the grip. “Joe-” he keens, “Joe, _please_ -”

“That's not what we're doing tonight, Nico.” It's a sign that things are ready to be escalated, that Nicky's ready to let his anger go.

Joe keeps his grip on Nicky's cock, forcing his beloved's balls between his thighs as the Genoan squirms in anticipation.

He doesn't have to wait long; the next hit comes down just as hard as the previous ones, the belt slapping across both buttocks and the delicate skin of Nicky's genitals. The pale man jolts with a strangled noise, hands clawing at the bedsheets in a desperate – but fruitless – attempt to get some distance between Joe's belt and his tender skin, forgetting, of course, that the other man still has a hold on his testicles.

“ _Joe-_ ” He's sobbing in earnest now, the tears running thick and fast down his face, clogging up his nose. Four more hits land within seconds of one another, each of them causing another escape attempt, and each time, Joe pulls him back and gives him another.

All Nicky can feel is pain, all his other toxic emotions having been scourged and released through his tears.

He's crying so hard by now that he doesn't even realise that Joe's stopped, laid the belt down on the floor.

It's not until the bed dips and there are warm arms pulling him to lay on his side, his back against Joe's chest in their usual sleeping position, his own chest heaving as he struggles to regulate his breathing. His other half is a steady, solid presence, though, so it doesn't take long to fall back into a steady-ish short of pattern.

Joe rubs a hand up and down Nicky's body – his arm, his ribs, his back, his thigh – calm and silent at his back as he waits out the storm, withdrawing only for a second when the other man rolls over to press his face into Joe's shirt, soaking the material through before long.

“Do you want to sit up and drink some water, _habibi?_ ” Joe asks when Nicky's stopped crying, brushing a light kiss against his other half's hair. There's a tentative nod against his chest, so he gently guides both of them up. The evidence of their session is already gone from Nicky's skin, but that doesn't mean that sitting is any easier – it just means that it's not putting pressure on his body that causes his wince, it's the emotional pressure, but he feels infinitely lighter and warmer than he did before.

Still, he takes the glass of water Joe offers him and downs it, gives as a small smile as the other man uses a little of the water from the jug to clean the salt from his face. He watches Joe text Andy with the bowl of food in one hand, taking small bites despite his lack of hunger – it's been a while since they last ate, and if he doesn't eat now, he'll be ravenous tomorrow morning.

“Thanks for looking after me, Joe.”


End file.
